Absence Management

• Introduction­
­
• Showing absences­
• Create an absence­
• Managing Vacations­­
• Bulk Update "Vacation Balance" and "Vacation Days per Year"­­
• [Absence Workflow]
­
• Setting Bank Holidays
• Related Tutorials

­Introduction

Absences Management in ]po[ is required for ]po[ Resource Management and ]po[ Timesheet Management. 

Showing absences

Absences are shown on main tab ABSENCES (http://[YOUR_SERVER]//intranet-timesheet2/absences/).
By default, absences for the next 3 weeks are shown graphically.
When choosing a different time scale, only the absence list is shown.  
­

­Create an absence

• Absences are created from the ADMIN LINKS on page ABSENCES (http://[YOUR_SERVER]//intranet-timesheet2/absences/). 
• If an absences that starting in the current year and ending in the next year should be entered as two absence records wheres the first entry indicates the days for the current year and the second entry the part for the new year.
  Example:
  
          Vacation Start:  27th. of December 2012 
          Vacation End:   4th. of January 2013
  
  results in two absence records:
  
           First Absence:
                                     Start 27th. December 2012, End: 31th. December 2012
           Second Absence:
                                     Start 1st. January 2013, End: 4th. January 2013  ­

Managing Vacations

Setting 'Vacation Days per year'  ­

Vacation days per year need to be set for each employee in the 'Employee Information' portlet:

In few cases ]po[ is the "Master System" for Vacation Balance. The official Vacation  Account is usually managed by the HR department.
At the beginning of the new year, HR staff usually compares the vacation days captured with ]po[ with the records maintained in the Master HR system.
It then evaluates the new Vacation Balance and updates the following two Employee Attributes in ]po[ per user:

• Vacation days per Year (if necessary)
• Vacation balance from last Year    
  

Balance

Current 'Vacation Balance' is shown in portlet 'Vacation Balance'.

When an absence of type 'Vacation' is entered, the balance will be adjusted accordingly.

Bulk Update "Vacation Balance" and "Vacation Days per Year"

In order to update user attributes "Vacation Balance" and "Vacation Days per Year", relevant data can be exported to CSV format and back imported again. The following fields are exported from the database:

• Employee Id
  
• Name of employee
• Current value of  "Vacation Days per Year"
• Current value of "Vacation Balance"
• Vacation Days taken last Year
  

In addition to the above Employee attributes, two additional columns are added:

• Vacation Balance (new) which is calculated as follows:
  Vacation Days per Year + Vacation Balance - Vacation Days taken last Year
• Vacation days per year (new)
  Preset:  Vacation Days per Year 
  

Importing updates "Vacation Balance" and "Vacation Days per Year" based on values found in the two additional columns. 

Links for Import/Export can be found in the ADMIN menu of the Absence main page (http://[YOUR_SERVER]/intranet-timesheet2/absences/index).
Export requires privilege "View absences all" and Import is available for System Administrators and HR-Managers only. 

Absence Workflow

]po[ comes with a pre-configured "One-Step" Absence Workflow:

      Figure 1: One-Step Absence Approval Workflow 

                            Figure 1: Two-Step Absence Approval Workflow 

Other Process Variants: 

Workflow Step: "Apply"

• [no options]
  

Workflow Step: "Approve" 

• Approver does approve
• Option: Notification by email 
• Option: Notification in WF inbox
• Option: Personal Notification (outside the system)
• System: Set absence status to 'approved' ­
  
  
• Approver does NOT approve
• Option: System sends email notification to user
• System: Set absence status to 'rejected'
  
• Option: Submitter receives notification in WF Inbox
• Option: Submitter needs to confirm denial of approval
• Approver will be informed about user confirmation
• Option: By notification in WF inbox
• Option: Notification by email
• Option: System deletes absence 
  

Workflow Step: "Acknowledge" 

• HR: acknowledge
• System: Reduce vacation account
  

Handing events while workflow case is in process:

Submitter withdraws application

• State: Application has already been approved by Supervisor but has not been acknowledged yet by HR
  
• Option: Supervisor will be informed
• Option: By notification in WF inbox
• Option: Notification by email
• Option: Supervisor will NOT be informed
  

• State: Application has already been approved by Supervisor has been acknowledged by HR
  
  
• System: Contra entry "Vacation Balance"
  

• Option: Supervisor will be informed
• Option: By notification in WF inbox
• Option: Notification by email
  
  
• Option: HR will be informed
• Option: By notification in WF inbox
• Option: Notification by email

Approver changes application before HR acknowledged:

• Approver will be informed about change
• Option: By notification in WF inbox
• Option: Notification by email

Approver/HR changes application after HR has acknowledged:

• Submitter will be informed about change
• Option: By notification in WF inbox
• Option: Notification by email
  
• Option: Personal Notification (outside the system)
  
  
­

• Approver/HR will be informed about change
• Option: By notification in WF inbox
• Option: Notification by email
  
  
• System: Adjust Vacation Balance
  

System Behaviour:

After "Apply" 

• System does not allow another application for the same period of time 
  [yet to be implemented]
  

­

Setting Bank Holidays

­

 b) When asked for absence type, choose Bank Holiday

 c) Make sure you set field "Valid for Group" to "Employees"

Related Tutorials

• How to configure the absence workflow